After all the horror stories of how a National health care system might bring disaster to us, including "death squads" roaming around the country, I feel compelled to share my experiences with a national health care system.

I am a U.S. citizen, but I lived in Canada for 11 years. I have had major surgery there. I, along with my brothers, make all medical decisions for my mom, who is in a government-run nursing home in Canada.

Here are some of the claims that I have heard about a Canadian style system (in quotation marks) followed by my own experience:

"A Government bureaucrat will get between you and your doctor."

I never had this happen in my 11 years of living in Canada or taking care of my mom.

"A national health care system like Canada's will have a lot of bureaucracy."

The U.S. system has far more bureaucracy than the Canadian system. In my entire time in Canada, I don't recall ever getting a bill. All claims from the doctor, all operations, and all stays in the hospital were billed directly to the government. Likewise, this was true with my mother.

Also, unlike in the U.S., your medical card and ID number do not change every time your employer seeks to find a lower cost insurance carrier. Once it is in the system, the number stays the same - no need to constantly update files at every doctor's office, laboratory, hospital, etc.

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"Taxes are higher in Canada."

Yes, taxes in most cases are higher. Whatever medical system you have, care is not "free." If you have health care through a company, your health care is not "free" either. Companies typically pay approximately $10,000 per family per year. In either system, we pay for health care.

Those higher taxes also cover many things beyond traditional health care. For example, taxes in British Columbia heavily subsidize the cost of long-term care. The facility my mother is in charges about one quarter of what similar facilities in the U.S. charge.

The important question is: which system offers lower cost to the consumer and better value? The Economist magazine says that as a percent of GDP, the United States spends 64 percent more per capita on health care than Canada.

"There are long waits for care in Canada, and care is inferior."

Yes, there are sometimes waits for non-urgent elective care in Canada. I am not aware of anyone ever waiting for urgent care. My mother had kidney cancer many years ago and underwent surgery more quickly than my office co-worker in the U.S. who had cancer at the same time. Neither I, nor my mother, have never even waited for elective care - it has always been there when we needed it.

But maybe the bottom line is that if care is so deficient in Canada, why is their life expectancy 2.5 years longer than in the U.S.? (Source: The Economist).

"Care is rationed in Canada."

This conjures up images of the elderly being denied critical care, or waiting in long lines for some aspirin to be handed out. In my total time in Canada, neither I nor my 91-year-old mother has ever experienced "rationed care." We have never felt that the doctor was holding back care.

I also find this statement odd, in that it implies that we do not ration care in the U.S. - that everyone who wants good health care gets it. But care in the U.S. is "rationed." Politicians, people who work for large corporations or the government, and the wealthy have access to the best care. Others don't.

I want to make it clear that I am not saying that we should simply adopt the Canadian health care system in the U.S. We have to find a solution that is right for us. But we will never find the best solution if we don't seek out the facts regarding other systems, and instead let ignorance and fear drive our decisions.

Rob Motta lives in Boulder. EDITOR'S NOTE: This is an online-only column and has not been edited.

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